Although Internet wagering games are currently illegal in the United States, they are very popular in many parts of the world. A recent poll of United States citizens determined that approximately 67% believed that the United States government should allow entities based in the United States to legally provide Internet wagering games.
One barrier to the further acceptance of online gaming by the United States government (and other governments) is the perception that online gaming very often involves cheating. Such cheating may take various forms. For example, some players are known to use so-called “bots” (or similar software) for Internet wagering games. These bots can apply perfect or nearly perfect strategies during game play. Other types of cheating involve unfair collaboration between players.
In some instances, the foregoing techniques have been combined to produce an even greater advantage. Moreover, some online players use multiple devices for cheating. For example, a player may use a first personal computer (“PC”) for participation in online gaming via, e.g., a gaming application and a restricted user account. A bot and remote control software may be running on a second PC, whereby the games played on the first PC are being controlled by the bot on the second PC. In this way, a human will appear to be participating in the online gaming sessions and could even interact with other players or provide other human responses that would be difficult to automate.
It will probably be illegal to provide Internet wagering games in the United States and other jurisdictions until it can be proven to gaming regulators that the games can be provided in a fair and honest fashion. Accordingly, it would be very desirable to develop new methods for detecting and preventing cheating in wagering games conducted via the Internet.